The following are my all-time favorite non-fiction books. how many of them have you read??
Adventure Capitalist: The Ultimate Road Trip
by Jim Rogers
Against the Gods
The Remarkable Story of Risk
by Peter L. Bernstein
Authentically Black: Essays for the Black Silent Majority
by John McWhorter
The Cash Nexus: Money and Power in the Modern World, 1700-2000
by Niall Ferguson
Churchill: A life
by Martin Gilbert
Conversationally Speaking : Tested New Ways to Increase Your Personal and Social Effectiveness
by Alan Garner
Colossus: The Price of America's Empire
by Niall Ferguson
The Effective Executive
by Peter F. Drucker
Exodus
by Leon Uris
Fooled by Randomness
by Nassim Taleb
Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything
by Steven D. Levitt, Stephen J. Dubner
Generations
The History of America's Future, 1584 to 2069
by William Strauss & Neil Howe
How the Mind Works
by Steven Pinker
Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion
by Robert B. Cialdini
John J. McCloy: Chairman of the Establishment
by Kai Bird
Just and Unjust Wars
by Michael Walzer
The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat : And Other Clinical Tales
by Oliver Sacks
The Moral Animal : Why We Are, the Way We Are: The New Science of Evolutionary Psychology
by Robert Wright
Night
by Elie Wiesel
The Nurture Assumption
by Judith Rich Harris
Outliers
by Malcolm Gladwell
Path to Power: Early Life of Lyndon Johnson
by Robert A. Caro
A Piece of the Action
How the Middle Class Became the Money
by Joseph Nocera
The Prize
The Epic Quest for Oil, Money, and Power
by Daniel Yergin
Stumbling on Happiness
by Daniel Gilbert
Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman!: Adventures of a Curious Character
by Richard P. Feynman
The Tipping Point
by Malcolm Gladwell
We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will be Killed With Our Families: Stories from Rwanda
by Philip Gourevitch
Why We Buy: The Science Of Shopping
by Paco Underhill
A World Lit Only by Fire : The Medieval Mind and the Renaissance – Portrait of an Age
by William Manchester
The Wisdom of Crowds
by James Surowiecki
7/31
12, no bad at all. Thank you for suggesting the others.
12 of them with one on the nightstand…
nice list – I enjoyed Yergin’s NEXT book – The Commanding Heights – even more than The Prize.
Last Friday night, without social obligation, I printed out your reading list and went to the library for a “preview” of these books. I think this serves well as a way of exploring new books outside of my own path(sort of like blind dates).
I managed to have a good look at several of them (Generations, We wish to inform you…, The Cash Nexus, etc). And I borrowed Freakonomics, Wisdom of crowds, and Conversationally speaking. It was my first time in years to borrow books from a library after university.
I’m usually a quiet blog reader but I want to thank you for sharing the list. From what I’ve glimpsed so far, the “Wisdom” and “Conversationally” seem to be stating the obvious but I’m sure there must be some significance in recommending them so I’ll keep reading.
Thanks again!
Agnes — it is very inspiring that you went to the library and got these books. i really hope this contributes to your happiness.
great list! had to order couple of books you mentioned which I was planning to read for a long time. I have also found Charlie Munger’s book (Poor Charlie’s Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charles T Munger) very insightful. His speech is one of a kind, you can read it at http://vinvesting.com/docs/munger/human_misjudgement.html
Thanks!
Great list.
I would recommend:
Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II, by John W. Dower
It is absolutely fascinating to read about how Japan moved from a near feudal society to Democracy in a single generation.
The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York by Robert A. Caro
Robert Caro is one of my favorite authors. This book shows the acquisition of power and the corrupting nature of unchecked power.
Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin
Lincoln has a profound gift for understanding and influencing people. Plus – he tells terrific stories.
All the best,
Mario Wilson